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Samarkand ( , , , ) is the
second-largest city in Uzbekistan and the capital of Samarqand Province. The city is most noted for its central
position on the Silk Road between China
and the West, and for being an Islamic centre for scholarly study.
The
Bibi-Khanym
Mosque remains one of the city's most famous
landmarks.The Registan was the
ancient centre of the city.In 2001, UNESCO inscribed
the 2,750-year-old city on the World
Heritage List as Samarkand - Crossroads of
Cultures.

Etymology

Samarkand derives its name from the Old
Persianasmara, "stone", "rock", and Sogdiankand, "fort",
"town".

Population

In 1939 Samarkand had a population of 134,346, and in 2008 an urban
population of 596,300. They are mostly Persian-speakingTajiks. Along with Bukhara, Samarkand
is one of the historical centers of the Tajik people in Central
Asia.

Although a Persian-speaking region,
it was not united politically with Iran between the times of
Alexander and the Arab conquest. The Greeks referred to Samarkand
as Maracanda. In the 6th century it was within the
domains of a Turkish
kingdom.

Medieval history

At the start of the 8th century Samarkand came under Arab
control.Under Abbasid rule,
the legend goes , the secret of papermaking was obtained from two Chinese prisoners from the Battle of Talas in 751, which led to the first paper mill in the Islamic world to be founded in
Samarkand. The invention then spread to the rest of the
Islamic world, and from there to Europe.

From the 6th to the 13th century it grew larger and more populous
than modern Samarkand and was controlled by the Western Turks, Arabs (who converted the area to Islam), Persian Samanids,
Kara-Khanid Turks, Seljuk Turks, Kara-Khitan, and Khorezmshah before being sacked by the Mongols under Genghis
Khan in 1220 . A small part of the population survived, but
Samarkand suffered at least another Mongol sack by Khan Baraq to get treasure he needed
to pay an army with. The town took many decades to recover from
these disasters.

14th century

In 1365 a revolt against Mongol control occurred in
Samarkand.

In 1370,
Timur the Lame, or Tamerlane, decided to make
Samarkand the capital of his empire, which extended from India to Turkey.
During the next 35 years he built a new city and populated it with
artisans and craftsmen from all of the places he had conquered.
Timur gained a reputation as a patron of the arts and Samarkand
grew to become the centre of the region of Transoxiana. During this time the city had a
population of about 150,000.

15th century

Between
1424 and 1429, the great astronomer Ulugh
Beg built the Samarkand Observatory. The sextant was 11
metres long and once rose to the top of the surrounding three
storey structure although it was kept underground to protect it
from earthquakes. Calibrated along its length, it was the world’s
largest 90 degree quadrant, at the time. However, the observatory
was destroyed by religious fanatics in 1449.

Modern history

In 1499 the Uzbek Turks took control of Samarkand. The Shaybanids
emerged as the Uzbek leaders at or about this time.

In the
16th century, the Shaybanids moved their
capital to Bukhara and
Samarkand went into decline. After an assault by the Persian
king, Nadir Shah, the city was abandoned
in the 18th century, about 1720 or a few years later.

The city
came under Russian rule after the citadel had been taken by a force
under Colonel Alexander Abramov in
1868. Shortly thereafter the small Russian garrison of 500
men were themselves besieged. The assault, which was led by Abdul Malik
Tura, the rebellious elder son of the Bukharan Emir, and Bek of Shahrisabz, was beaten off with heavy losses.Abramov,
now a general, became the first Governor of the Military Okrug which the Russians established along the course
of the River Zeravshan, with Samarkand as the administrative
centre. The Russian section of the city was built after this
point, largely to the west of the old city.

Climate

The climate is sharp continental. Summers are dry and hot, whilst
winters are cold. July and August are the hottest months of the
year with temperatures reaching, and exceeding, . Most of the
little annual precipitation is received from December through
April.

Notable people born in Samarkand

Amoghavajra, an 8th century Buddhist
monk who translated Vajrayana scripture,
became a powerful figure in the Tang court, and is remembered one
of the three founders of Chinese esoteric Buddhism.

Qulich Khan Siddiqi (Nawab Khwaja Abid Siddiqi) and Ghazi Uddin
Khan Siddiqi, father and grand father of Qamar-ud-din Khan, Asaf Jah I
(Nizam I). Nizam I founded the dynasty that ruled Hyderabad (India)
for over 200 years.

The Road to
Samarcand is one of Patrick
O'Brian's early novels (1954) about an American teenage boy,
the son of recently deceased missionary parents, who travels from
China with a small party on the Silk Road en route to the
West.

In Dnevnoy dozor aka Daywatch (2006), Timur Bekmambetov's epic tale of Good
versus Evil, one of the main characters, Anton, sets himself on a
mission to find the Chalk of Destiny which he believes is hidden in
Timerlane's grave at the city of Samarkand.

In The Venetian
Betrayal suspense novel by Steve
Berry, the much of the plot involves a fictional Central Asian
Federation composed of a united Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikstan,
Turkmenistan and the threat its despotic ruler poses to the area
fueled by biological weapons and the mysterious final resting place
of Alexander the Great.

In Islamic literature and discussions, Samarkand has taken on a
semi-mythological status and is often cited as an ideal of Islamic
philosophy and society, a place of justice, fairness, and righteous
moderation.

Nigerian writer Wole Soyinka,
winner of the 1986 Nobel Prize
in Literature, explores the metaphysical significance of the
marketplace in a volume of poetry entitled Samarkand and Other
Markets I Have Known, 2002.

In the American film classic It's a Wonderful Life, the
character George Bailey (played by James Stewart) shops for a suitcase,
saying, "I want something for a thousand and one nights, with
plenty of room for labels from Italy and Baghdad, Samarkand... a
great big one."

In the Technicolor movie The
Golden Horde, the main character, played by David Farrar, defends Samarkand against
the Horde. He utters the memorable line, "He who comes to destroy
Samarkand shall himself be destroyed."

Samarkand has been cited as an inspiration for the fictional
city of Zanarkand from Final Fantasy X

In the song "Sheherazade," on his 1988 album One More Story, Peter Cetera refers to the "Sultan of
Samarkand" as the enchanted king of the One Thousand and One
Nights tale.

In the novel "The Storyteller's Daughter", a retelling of the
Arabian Nights / The 1000 Nights by Cameron Dokey, it is the home
of a ruler.

In non-fiction

See No
Evil by Robert Baer is an
autobiography about the author's experiences working for the
CIA, at one point
visiting Samarkand while serving in Tajikistan in the early 1990s.

Ibn Battuta the great traveler of
the 14th century spent time in Samarkand in the 1330s (see Ross
Dunn The Adventures of Ibn Battuta: A Muslim Traveler of the
14th century).

Robert D.Kaplan's 1996 political travelogue The
Ends Of The Earth has him traversing through a number of
places in Africa, Europe, and Asia. In that book, one of the countries is
Uzbekistan, and Samarkand is one of the places in Uzbekistan
he visits, along with a young translator whose namesake is Ulug Beg.

Murder in Samarkand
by Craig Murray is a book about the UK
Ambassador to Uzbekistan's experiences in this role, until he
resigned over human rights abuses in the country in October
2004.

In The
Travels of Marco Polo, where
Polo records his journey along the Silk Road, Samarkand is
described as a "a very large and splendid city..." Here also is
related the story of a Christian church in Samarkand, which
miraculously remained standing after a portion of its central
supporting column was removed.

Music

In 1977, the Italian singer and composer Roberto Vecchioni issued a LP titled
Samarcanda. It contains
the eponymous song, which tells the story of a soldier riding to
Samarkand to escape the image of death.

In 1987, dance music group The Beyond, signed to Midnight Music
Records, released the album Episcense which includes the
song "Samarkand Sunrise".

In 1994, the Spanish rock band La Frontera released the album
La rueda de las armas afiladas which includes the song
"Arenas de Samarkanda". It was released as a single.

Also in 1994, the Esperanto folk duo Nataŝa & Ĵomart
released the album Samarkand.

In 2004, violinist Lucia
Micarelli released the album Music from a Farther
Room, which includes the song "Samarkand".

Other sister cities

Gallery

Image:Man
at Registan - Samarkand - 15-10-2005.jpg|A man seated before the
RegistanImage:SamarkandBibiKhanym.jpg|Façade of the
Bibi-Khanym
MosqueImage:SamarkandTillaKari.jpg|Decorations
inside Tilla-Kari MedressaImage:SamarkandGuriAmir.jpg|Muqarnas decorations inside the Gur-e AmirImage:Storks samarkand.jpg|Colour photograph
of a Madrasa taken in Samarkand ca. 1912 by Sergey
Prokudin-Gorsky.Image:Gorskii_04439u.jpg|Fields near
SamarkandImage:Prokudin-Gorskii-54.jpg|Jewish children with their
teacher in Samarkand, before 1915Image:Minaret in Samarkand.jpg|A
minaret in Samarkand